September 20, 2013 Friday
Day 76
Left Whitehorse, Yukon this morning and decided to take a scenic route, on the South Klondike Highway to Carcross, then cut over northeast on Tagish Road and get back on the Alaska Highway heading east to Watson Lake, Yukon Territory. Our side trip was well worth it!
Here's a sampling of what we saw:
On the South Klondike Highway:
Emerald Lake - a deep emerald green with other rainbow like colors. The lake's color has to do with "marl" on the lake bottom. Marl is a mixture of decomposing shells and clay. Brilliant colored lake, even on a cloudy day.
Caribou Mountain - 5,645 feet, rising up right next to the road
Carcross Desert - area of sand dunes, billed as "the world's smallest desert" - the remains of a large glacial lake with a sandy bottom. Cool, it reminded me of some of the dunes along Lake Michigan
Carcross - population 399, located on beautiful Bennett Lake. A darling town with several cabins and other buildings from the very early 1900s. We drove the walking tour (our time was limited) but we were able to see these wonderful historic structures, still being used today. One stop we made time for, though, was The Chilkoot Trail Authentic Sourdough Bakery. The baker, a sweet young woman, told us she was filling in for the bakery owner who is her boyfriend's aunt. The aunt - owner was away on her combination honeymoon and hunting trip. Michael and I shared a slice of the most incredibly moist cranberry zucchini lime cake. Oh I wish I had some right now!
Fox - on the way out of Carcross, we saw a beautiful fox sunning on a hill right on the side of the road. Michael has the most amazing ability to spot wildlife, even while driving and concentrating on the road. He has a real talent there.
On Tagish Road:
Chootla Lake
Montana Mountain 7,230 feet high
Tagish - population 206. Located on the Tagish River
After Tagish, we got back on the Alaska Highway heading east to Watson Lake, Yukon. We drove along Teslin Lake, 86 miles long. The fall colors have really peaked here, vibrant golds and yellows and greens. There is very little traffic on this road, and of the few businesses there are, most have closed for winter. The road dipped down into BC for 42 miles, past Swan Lake, Screw Creek (haha!) then we were back in The Yukon. As we travelled along, we saw the Rancheria River; also saw rock messages, spelled out along the highway here. White round stones on the dirt hillsides. These messages were started in 1990 by a swim team from Fort Nelson. People have been adding to these since.
It has been a fairly nice day with on and off sun, low 50s. A welcome change from cold rain.
We camped at Baby Nugget RV Park, just west of Watson Lake, Yukon. Nice, clean campsites. Their restaurant is called Wolf It Down Restaurant, we thought this was funny.
We set up, unhooked the car and drove around Watson Lake, the town for a little bit. Stopped at the World Famous Sign Post Forest. The forest was started in 1942 by a homesick US Army G. I., Carl Lindley of Danville, IL. Carl was working on the Alaska Highway, and he put up a sign here, pointing the way and stating the mileage to his hometown. Others followed his lead and people are still posting signs today. In 1990 there were 10,000 signs. There are thousands more today. The town of Watson Lake maintains the site and they install more posts as needed.
We spent over an hour reading signs; it was such fun. We couldn't help but wonder at all the official town and street signs that had to have been stolen and brought to post here. Some were huge! Michael had bought an Emerald Isle license-plate like sign at home and apparently, I was supposed to remember to bring it to post here. Only, I neglected to bring it, oops. It would have been fun to add it to this "forest". I suggested we just take our car license plate off, but that didn't go over well, haha!
Most everything is closed for winter here in Watson Lake. We stopped at the one open grocery store and paid $6 for a gallon jug of drinking water. Geez!
Back at camp, we hiked for about an hour through the forest. Nice.
9,276 miles so far